The present invention relates generally to microfluidic laboratory technology for chemical, physical, and/or biological analysis, separation, or synthesis of substances on a substrate with a microfluidic structure. It relates in particular to valves associated with microfluidic assemblies, and more specifically, to component parts of valves adapted to control the flow of liquid samples for analytical purposes.
There is a growing demand for biological fluid processing systems that have generated a need for small fluidic valves. Such miniaturized microfluidic devices has to fulfill a variety of requirements such as low dead volume and short flow paths with a cross section as constant as possible. This results generally in an improved performance characteristic. A sufficient approach in the field—compared for example to the use of valves with threaded connections—is the use of microfluidic chips coupled to revolving valve elements for flow controlling the microfluidic processes executed within the chip. One solution to reduce dead volumes is disclosed for example in the US 2003/0015682 A1. Due to enormous amounts of samples and components to be analyzed, efforts in the field are made as well to reduce analyzing time. These efforts have led to parallelized and more time efficient processes as shown for example in the EP 1 162 464 A1 or in the WO 01/84143 A1, but also to higher complexity of systems and executed processes, and consequently to an increased expenditure for controlling. In particular, coupling and flow controlling is an important matter of the latest developments in the technical field of microfluidic devices as shown for example in the EP 0 310 4413.4 (not published yet). Increasing the complexity of the processes executed by the microfluidic devices generally results disadvantageously in a higher amount of interconnections to be realized, switched, and/or flow controlled. HPLC valves are described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,616,300. Microfluidic valves are known from US2003/0015682 and US2003/0116206.